Speaking to RFE/RL by Skype on October 23, Raqqawi said that life
for ordinary Raqqa residents has changed dramatically since the
United States and its allies began air strikes against ISIS
targets. Fearing they would be hit in the air raids, those who
were able to fled the city to take refuge elsewhere.

"After the air strikes started, people got scared," he says.
"Some people escaped to Turkey or Damascus or to other
government-controlled areas."

Some of Raqqa's civilians who were not able to escape have left
the city for the surrounding countryside, Raqqawi says.

While Islamic State militants maintain their presence in Raqqa,
they are taking care not to go out on the streets to avoid the
air strikes, he adds.

IS has also sent many of its militants to Kobani, the northern
Syrian town under siege by ISIS gunmen.

"Their women and children they sent to Iraq, or to Deir Ezzor,"
Raqqawi says, referring to the eastern Syrian province, much of
which is under Islamic State control.

For most of the day, Raqqa's streets are empty, "like a ghost
city," according to Raqqawi. People only go out onto the streets
for a few hours every morning, to buy basic goods for the day.

"It is still possible to buy things, but there are huge crowds of
people in places where bread is sold because the bakeries are
only open for a few hours every morning. The prices are also much
higher since the air strikes started," Raqqawi told RFE/RL.

Although IS has sent many of its militants out of the city, the
extremist group has not relinquished its grip on Raqqa.

A
militant Islamist fighter uses a mobile to film his fellow
fighters taking part in a military parade along the streets of
Syria's northern Raqqa province June 30, 2014.REUTERS/Stringer

The city's schools are closed, and women are not allowed out onto
the streets unless they wear a niqab and are accompanied by a close male
relative.

ISIS militants are also still carrying out brutal executions of
Raqqa's civilians.

"The executions are a little bit less now, because there are
fewer people to be executed. But last Friday they executed two
people here in the public square," Raqqawi says.

One of the men who was executed had committed the crime of
"saying a bad word about Allah," according to Raqqawi.

There had been an altercation between some IS militants and the
man's parents. The man joined in and was arrested. The man became
angry and said the "bad word."

"So they executed him," Raqqawi says.

Although Raqqa's citizens are afraid of the coalition air strikes
on their city, they "are happy because the US aircraft are better
than Al-Assad's aircraft, because Al-Assad kills ordinary people,
but the coalition doesn't kill civilians," Raqqawi says,
referring to Syrian President Bashar Al-Assad.

Raqqawi says that many in Raqqa think the air strikes have come
too late.

He believes the United States and its allies should have
prevented ISIS from taking over the city in the first place, by
arming the Free Syrian Army.

"If the United States had given the FSA weapons, then they would
have been able to kick ISIS out of the city. ISIS would not have
taken over. The Americans and the international community said
they would give weapons but it was all lies. Just talk, talk,
talk," says Raqqawi.

Raqqa has a long history, and has survived the rise and fall of
empires.

Founded around 244 BC by the Seleucids, Raqqa (then named
Kallinikos) was conquered by the Byzantines, destroyed by the
Persian Sasanids in 542 A.D., and later rebuilt by the Byzantine
emperor Justinian I. In the sixth century, Raqqa was a center for
Syriac Christianity (the city's Christian population has now fled
or been killed by ISIS).

Between 796 and 809 A.D., the town was the capital of the Abbasid
Caliphate under Caliph Harun Al-Rashid. In recent times, the city
rebelled against Syria's current president, Bashar Al-Assad. The
city survived all these upheavals, but Raqqawi is not sure it
will be able to expel ISIS any time soon.

"Now ISIS is so strong. It controls Raqqa and soon it will
control many more cities in Syria. ISIS will grow stronger. Then
there will be a real risk that no one will be able to fight
them," he concludes.